Next generation hotspot Wi-Fi to raech $150 billion in operator revenue by 2018
Interest in this technology has been fueled by the world’s largest operators and vendors recently completing a number of advanced trials of NGH which led to the introduction of critical features such as seamless authentication; automatic network detection selection, adoption and secure access. This will ultimately give users easier access to a far greater number of public Wi-Fi access points around the world, without the need for usernames and passwords.
With an increasing number of sophisticated and data hungry mobile devices now available on the market, operators have been forced to address the capacity conundrum and Wi-Fi has proven to be the silver bullet. However, there is a need to move beyond legacy hotspot Wi-Fi and upgrade to NGH that today boasts secure authentication and automatic service discovery and selection, and will soon include online signup and policy support. However, what are the ROI benefits that operators can expect when they take the plunge and deploy this type of network?
The report examines the cost and revenue benefits that NGH will bring to fixed and mobile operators. Exploring the cost savings from NGH Wi-Fi adoption as a complement to 3G and 4G networks, it compares scenarios with varying percentages of traffic transported by NGH Wi-Fi, macro cells, small cells or legacy Wi-Fi. In the second half of the paper, a revenue model presents a forecast of global service revenues from NGH Wi-Fi, based on the traffic that it will transport within the mobile radio-access network.
Key findings include:
- A higher proportion of data traffic carried by NGH Wi-Fi leads to lower per-bit costs. Mobile operators can reduce their per-bit RAN costs by 18% when they carry 20% of their traffic through NGH Wi-Fi.
- The combination of Wi-Fi and cellular small cells brings additional cost savings and higher profitability. The per-bit cost in a network with NGH Wi-Fi and 4G small cells may be 38% of those of a 3G macro network.
- The ability of NGH Wi-Fi to drive more traffic than legacy Wi-Fi from the same infrastructure results in lower per-bit costs for NGH Wi-Fi over legacy Wi-Fi. If the traffic in a legacy network is 25% of that in an NGH Wi-Fi network, the overall per-bit costs will grow by 18%.
- Based on the potential cost savings and operator commitments, it is forecasted that NGH Wi-Fi to account for 9% of global mobile traffic and reach $150 billion USD in operator revenue by 2018.
If you enjoyed this article, you will like the following ones: don't miss them by subscribing to :
